2016

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No One is Illegal: Three Shorts presented with GRAMNet

BUNKERS (Anne-Claire Adet | France/Switzerland | 2016 | 14m)

A Sudanese journalist has found himself living in cramped dorms with dozens of people, three floors underground. Cockroaches crawl the yellow walls and oxygen is sparse. Switzerland is putting refugees in bunkers. Through the story of Mohammad and images taken by refugees using their mobile phone, live a sensorial immersion into the suffocating life of an underground shelter where asylum-seekers are crammed into upon their arrival in Geneva.

Stateless on Lesvos (Guy Smallman | UK | 2015 | 26m)

Shot over three days on the Greek island now famous for receiving hundreds of thousands of refugees from Turkey. Filmmaker Guy Smallman concentrated not on the refugees themselves but on the incredible dedication and humanity of the Greek and international volunteers assisting the most vulnerable people on the planet as they attempt to reach a place of safety.

Transit Zone (Frederik Subei | UK | 2015 | 32m)

After spending three months living with the refugees in ‘the jungle’, the makeshift camps of Calais, Frederik Subei presents us with the story of Teefa, A Sudanese refugee looking to cross to UK. Life is not easy with limited access to water, food and shelter, especially during the winter. Nevertheless the sense of community is remarkable. Teefa is determined to fulfil his dream and start a new life in England. But sneaking onto a lorry is difficult and only a few people are lucky enough to succeed. Teefa has been stuck in the jungle for almost six months and is tired of this life. As all camps are evicted by the police, he starts to question the greatness of Britain and thinks about applying for asylum in France.

No One Is Illegal: Non-Citizens and the European Imaginary

“I’m not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.” Socrates, as quoted in Plutarch’s Of Banishment, graffiti remarked upon in Xenos (Mahdi Fleifel, 2013)

In 2016, what constitutes being a citizen? What structures do refugees have to navigate to survive? Panellists will discuss the refugee experience in 2016, in the light of Brexit and unprecedented tumult across the continent and beyond, and ask how the west’s imagination of itself clashes with the documented reality. How do we reassert the human rights of non-citizens?

This event is free and unticketed.

We Come As Friends: Colonial Pathologies in the African Continent

In 2016 Sub-Saharan Africa finds itself at the epicentre of a global conflict between neo-imperial superpowers, with the flows of globalised capitalism converging to inflict environmental degradation and human exploitation on a grotesque scale. Panellists will discuss the central re-formulation of old colonial pathologies and how their representation in cinema might help shape our understanding of a complex and devastating form of 21st century conflict.

The panel will be chaired by Finn Daniels-Yeomans (Africa in Motion, University of Glasgow).

This event is free and unticketed.

50 Feet From Syria

50 Feet From Syria is a portrait of surgeon Hisham Bismar as he performs intricate acts of medical necessity undeterred by the chaos and complexity of war around him. The film serves as a snapshot in time of the plight of refugees displaced by the Syrian uprising and indelibly communicates the human cost of one of most brutal, dehumanizing conflicts in modern history that continues to destroy and displace millions of lives.

This event is free and unticketed.

CATCH-19to25

From the director of Document 2015’s 9999, CATCH-19to25 is a personal reflection about the relation between a man and his peculiar life and work circumstances. The film focuses on details, like the protagonist, and gives insight in a major problem of society: the temporal housing of victims of war.

This event is free and unticketed.

Limpiadores

Migrating is seldom an easy solution. It is rather a journey, that begins with a journey. After more than eight years of campaigning, the immigrant cleaners outsourced at the School of
Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London continue to demand being brought in-house.
Limpiadores charts the history of their and others’ campaigns – from winning the London Living Wage to the deportation of nine colleagues, and the day-to- day invisible labour of cleaners on
our campus.

This event is free and unticketed.

Nobody Plays the Trombone Anymore

Cuberto Ortíz Ramos has been missing since September 26, 2014. Together with 42 other young students, he was kidnapped in the town of Ayotzinapan. In his rural village, his absence is acutely felt by family, friends and the local band in which he played the trombone.

This event is free and unticketed.

Siberia in a Summer Dress

With the ardor of his 25 years, Alexei Lungu lives life to the fullest, even if his village is under Soviet occupation. On the night of June 12th 1941, he will be the witness of a deportation orchestrated by the political police and the Red Army. 55 years later, all that is left is the memory of that summer night recounted to his grandson.

This event is free and unticketed.

Libya in Motion

A series of short stories from post-revolution Libya, filmed over three years by local emergent filmmakers. In documenting different facets of life in Libya during this turbulent period, the filmmakers have allowed us the chance to see their country beyond the news reports and headlines. Instead, the films are brief insights into the lives of people trying to find normality in a world of chaos and a testament to the courage and resilience of the filmmakers and the Libyan people as a whole.

We Come As Friends

A modern, dizzying, science fiction-like odyssey into the heart of Africa. At the moment when the Sudan, the continent’s biggest country, is being divided into two nations, an old ‘civilizing’ pathology re-emerges – that of colonialism, clash of empires, and renewed episodes of bloody (and holy) wars over land and resources. The director of Darwin’s Nightmare (2004) takes us on this voyage in his tiny, self-made flying machine of tin and canvas, leading us into people’s thoughts and dreams, in both stunning and heartbreaking ways. Adopting a vérité style inflected with elements of surrealism, Sauper pieces together the strange relationships between Chinese oil workers, UN peacekeepers, Sudanese warlords, and American evangelists.

Films

No One is Illegal: Three Shorts presented with GRAMNet

No One Is Illegal: Non-Citizens and the European Imaginary

We Come As Friends: Colonial Pathologies in the African Continent

50 Feet From Syria

CATCH-19to25

Limpiadores

Nobody Plays the Trombone Anymore

Siberia in a Summer Dress

Libya in Motion

We Come As Friends